How to Avoid Selling Low Margin Commodity Products

The Average Security Sale Is A Commodity Sale Too

Security is always in the news, and generally ranked high on the company initiatives list.

For ten years I’ve been encouraging resellers to put more focus on security – urgent security issues just seem to move people to buy faster than anything else…

Is SECURITY a good place to put more focus?

Most of the sales reps I know sell security appliances, but avoid higher-end security sales—a truism for both the manufacturer and reseller sides. Gross profits tend to be incremental and relatively low. Something obviously isn’t working on the reseller side.

Security Appliances Lead to Small Commissions

If you sell security appliances, you’ve likely noticed stiff competition can delay a sale by 9 or more months. You may be able to take your family out for a fast-food meal with your commission check, depending on your brand name, the brands you carry as a reseller and your product lines’ margins. You’re frequently asked to place an evaluation product onsite, using free installation services to get it up and running. Either way, the manufacturer claims the product installs “in minutes,” so there really isn’t much consulting business for this product, anyway. This hurts both the manufacturer (on the channel development side) and the reseller, who lives on gross profit. You conclude this may not be the right place to focus.

Early in my career I was a security presales consultant…whenever security came up in a sales meeting they would immediately call me. But too often the resulting meeting would turn into a feature/function battle over appliance brands. Months of debate to close a small appliance sale.

How to Multiply Your Commissions

The House & the Cloud – 2nd edition is a book of hope…and it’s almost ready for print. These issues are a symptom of treating security as a point product.

By the end of my book I hope you’ll understand why every client has a security need—and, by fulfilling this need, you can produce significant profits, regardless of your technology niche or the market you’re calling upon. In my opinion, when security is approached correctly, it becomes highly profitable, a powerful door opener, and something that is definitely not a commodity sale.

On a recent trip to Chicago, I ran into Steve, an alumnus from one of my Making Money w/ Security workshops. When I say him, I could tell he was happy to see me. He simply said: “I just turned an 80K opportunity into an 800K sale using the principles you taught us in your security workshop!” Many of these principles are in the first edition…

It’s not hard to sell security, but it does require a different approach—one you may not be used to taking. In the end, The House & the Cloud will give you a winning strategy for selling virtually any product or service by tying it to security.

Get the first edition Free right here – and I’ll be sure to notify you when the next edition is finally printed!